Anthologies One And Two Revisited By Terry McCarty

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Book Synopsis

Very early poems written between 1997 and 2001 which originally were part of the chapbooks Anthology One and Anthology Two.

REPRIMANDED EMPLOYEE

I stand, paralyzed,
as I, along with the rest of the office,
listen to you,
with your red voice and loud face,
as you proceed to call me incompetent and accuse me of
costing the company TIME.
And, of course,
TIME is MONEY.

I stand, paralyzed,
enduring your angry lecture,
reminding myself that
I literally cannot afford to respond.
Instead, I wait for you to finish
so I can go back to work
and waste no more TIME.

THE JOB INTERVIEW

Didn’t do any research on the company.
Didn’t read any books about
how to prepare for a successful job interview.
Didn’t know how to answer
most of the interviewer ’ s questions.
Didn’t know what questions
to ask the interviewer
about the job I was applying for.
Didn’t want the job anyway.
After the interview ends,
I leave the office building
and stand still on the sidewalk
as people hurry past me.
I return to my apartment,
change into my regular clothes
and call my parents
to tell them that the job interview
went well
and I should be hearing
from the company
any day now.

RELIEF

The customer just called again.
He’s still angry.
He’s upset with the service that
he received from the Company.
He’s convinced that the Company
is staffed by incompetent fools
who fail to take his complaints seriously.
He wants to take out his rage
and frustration on one person.
I am that person.
I swallow an antacid tablet,
do my best to calm him down
and make yet another effort
to listen to his complaints
and answer his questions
in the nicest possible voice.
Then I think of you.
Suddenly, I feel much better
even though an angry voice
roaring from a telephone headset
threatens to deafen me
at any second